


The Odds Were Never In Our Favour

by translorastyrell (nerddowell)



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Canon Divergence - Robert's Rebellion, Careers (Hunger Games), Dorne is a Career district since Oberyn Martell, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Hunger Games-Typical Death/Violence, I don't know what else to tag this as, Pre-Slash, Snapshots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-09-02 11:20:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16785943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerddowell/pseuds/translorastyrell
Summary: A Loras/RenlyHunger Gamesau, in which the Mad King Aerys, to punish the rebellious Westerosi 'districts' (the Seven Kingdoms, plus Dorne), instigates the annual Hunger Games as a way to keep his kingdom cowed and under control. Each district must have all children between the ages of 12 and 18 attend a public reaping, where two of them – one male, one female – are chosen by picking names out of a bowl to compete for blood-soaked glory and their lives in the tournament.Renly Week 2018fill for Day 3: Renly/Loras/Day 7: free choice.





	The Odds Were Never In Our Favour

They’ve managed to find what feels like the only truly safe space in the entire arena, and ironically, it’s the most open. The games arena is a city, full of yellow mud-brick buildings interwoven by narrow, winding streets perfect for ambushes and gamemaker traps to be sprung on those not wary enough; the focal point is a massive circular amphitheatre in the centre where the Cornucopia is set, built in the fashion of the fighting pits of Meereen. They’re hiding out in one of the guest boxes, one of the open cells in the honeycombed walls, high enough to have a good view of the entire amphitheatre below them. Loras, who is seemingly a favourite this year and thus receives the most sponsor gifts, has set up a sort of low-slung tent inside the cell, where Renly is lying on a mat of rushes and staring up at the stars behind the shimmery roof of the force-field around the arena.

The silence of the night is broken by the swell of triumphal music as the sigil of the king is broadcasted into the sky, a fluttering banner bearing a crowned, three-headed dragon spitting flame, followed by the faces and districts of those who have already been killed, along with a quick recap of how. Renly hates this part of the night. Loras looks forward to it, his eyes assessing as he works out who is left, how many other children they have to outlast or kill. It makes Renly a little sick to his stomach, and he can never bear for Loras to touch him afterwards for thinking about all of the blood on those brown hands.

District 1, the North: Robb and Jeyne. Both dead, killed by the weasel-faced male tribute from the Riverlands (Renly had watched him do it, sticking them both full of arrows from his treetop as they raced across the plains outside the city). District 2, the Vale: Hayle, the male tribute. Stepped off his platform before the cannon blast officially announcing the beginning of the games had finished echoing around the arena. Consumed by wildfire as green as his eyes. District 3, the Riverlands: Freya, the female tribute, and Waldar, Robb and Jeyne’s murderer. Dead at Loras’ hand a bare twenty minutes previous, when he had attempted to invade their safe haven; Loras had used a catapult made from a small Y-shaped twig and the elastic from his pant hems to propel stones, and had hit him in the temple. It had seemed to take him an age to die, convulsing there on the ground, as Loras watched with cold eyes and Renly had swallowed back bile. District 4, the Stormlands and Renly’s own district: Elenei, the twelve year old female tribute elected alongside him. She hadn’t outlasted the bloodbath at the Cornucopia. District 6, the Reach and Loras’ own district: Netta, the female tribute. A gamemaker trap, sprung when she crossed some invisible border between the relative safety of the house she’d been hiding out in and the street outside. District 7, the Westerlands: Clera and Cadoc, twins (as alike as two peas in a pod, Renly thinks, and remembers their mother sobbing on the television), dead from eating poisonous fruits. District 8, the Iron Islands: Theon and Danya. Both dead, Theon crushed by falling masonry - probably another gamemaker trap - and Danya at the hands of the Dornish Careers during the Cornucopia bloodbath.

The music plays again, deafening, and Renly buries his head in his arms, hands over his ears to try and shut it out. A moment later, Loras sits back down beside him and pulls them away, face serious.

‘There’s only five of us left. You, me, those Careers from Dorne, and the girl from the Vale.’ He looks back up at the sky. ‘She’s not a threat; she doesn’t attack. She’s playing a similar game to you, trying to last it out. I’ll pick her off later, if the others don’t get to her first. It’s those Dornish we should be wary of.’

Renly nods. He doesn’t like to think about Loras picking off the weaker tributes; it’s a dangerous line of thought, one that leads irrevocably to the end of the games and he and Loras facing one another, knowing that one has to die for the other to survive. The gamemakers don’t like compromises, don’t like draws; it’s a blood sport, and like any sport, there must be a winner. He and Loras had formed their alliance during their training week in the Capital, over a simulation in which Renly would have been hopelessly dead within seconds had Loras not thrown a particularly well-aimed knife at two simulated opponents.

Renly sighs, and then gasps in pain as he rolls onto his belly, the movement pulling at the wound in his side. It’s a deep, torn-open gash, all rough edges and oozing blood, inflicted by one of the Dornish girl - Arianne -’s throwing knives when he had skirted a little too close. He’s half convinced it was poisoned. Everyone knows the Dornish are trained in their Career centres to extract venoms and toxins from all manner of plants and animals; their most famous ex-tribute, after all, is Oberyn Martell, known as the Red Viper from the breed of snake from which he milked the venom that coated every blade he carried with him in the arena. He had entered at seventeen and proven himself victor within four days, and was still a very great favourite in the Capital, trotted out every so often for interviews and to give commentary on the games and the tributes involved.

Loras leans over him, peeling Renly’s filthy shirt away from the wound to inspect it. His face pales slightly, and Renly grins up at him wryly, eyes glassy with pain and fever.

‘I suspect the odds are somewhat not in my favour.’

‘I don’t care about the odds,’ Loras tells him fiercely, ‘I’m not going to let you die.’

‘Loras,’ Renly says quietly, reaching up to hold onto his sleeve, ‘the whole point of this contest is for fifteen of us to die.’

‘Not _you_.’ Loras shakes his head. ‘Not _us_.’

**Author's Note:**

> Am I ever going to be able to write something that's not an AU for this fandom? Probably not.
> 
> Notes on this AU:
> 
> The districts/their specialities/famous ex-tributes (where applicable) are:  
> District 1 - the North: Mining.  
> District 2 - the Vale: Power (coal/wind power in this AU).  
> District 3 - the Riverlands: Livestock.  
> District 4 - the Stormlands: Fishing.  
> District 5 - Dorne: Luxury (esp. fabrics, spices). 'Career' district. Elia Martell, Oberyn Martell.  
> District 6 - the Reach: Agriculture.  
> District 7 - the Westerlands: Masonry. 'Career' district. Gregor Clegane.  
> District 8 - the Iron Islands: Fishing (secondary), transportation (esp. boats).
> 
> For the full notes/headcanon regarding this AU, click [here](http://bpdrenly.tumblr.com/private/180433951397/tumblr_piol3rHq1F1um9bbo) on my Tumblr.


End file.
